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Dr. David Hopson |
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September 24, 2007 At their September 12 meeting, the school committee began their 30-minute sessions to look towards renewing our long-range plan for Gateway. To begin this process, I provided a quick overview of what’s changed in the district over the past 5 to 6 years. This covered a broad array of items including a decrease in staffing, a decrease in students, a 50% reduction in grant funding, a reduction in Chapter 70 funding (including a reduction in per pupil funding from $4,938 in FY’03 to $4,527 this past year) and an overall reduction in the percentage of school costs paid for by the state. This has impacted more than just our local taxes. We have curtailed or eliminated a number of student opportunities including Net Prep (computer systems training), woodshop, multiple foreign languages, business courses, aviation courses, reading programs, elementary instrumental music and a school to career counselor. We have also increased athletic and afterschool program fees to sustain those offerings, and initiated new fees—including a $210/year parking fee for high school students who drive to school. The question of what we should provide for our students is complex and encompasses a variety of subjects. One of the concerns expressed by school committee members was how to separate subjects that are related to, but not interdependent on, each other. In essence the three major areas discussed were what to provide to students within our financial resources, whether or not to expand learning time and the issue of consolidating schools. These are areas that may impact each other, but can and should be considered separately. We can probably all agree that we want Gateway to provide appropriate educational opportunities for our children. We are also likely to have widely differing ideas about exactly what that means! Academics, career preparation, citizenship and health are just a few of the potential areas to consider in conjunction with state mandates for graduation, state frameworks tested on the MCAS, and the rules and regulations that schools must follow. How we offer opportunities to succeed in these areas is a separate question that encompasses many other factors. Finances, facilities, time, staffing, community support, supplies and so forth are details that may eventually determine which items are high priority and which are low priority. We all have different ideas about what is important for children, as is evidenced in discussions between any two adults. Thus, the difficult task is not just identifying what we’d like to see in schools, but coming to a consensus about which items are most important. As always, our school committee members and administrators are interested in the opinions of community members in general, as well as input from parents, staff and students. Please feel free to attend school committee meetings, provide input through the mail, contact your local school administrator or provide comments to myopinion@grsd.org so that we can accurately reflect the desires of our communities as we develop Gateway’s long-range plan. ### |
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